Dragon Raja; Chapter 3 Cassell’s Gate

Dragon Raja

There are always a few times in a person’s life when he feels that he has seen the door to heaven open. Lu Mingfei waited for eighteen years, and at his worst moment, the door finally opened.

Lu Mingfei typed “GG” (“GG” stands for “Good Game”, which is used to praise the opponent for playing well in competitive games, and also means to admit defeat) and exited the game.

The last scene on the screen showed twelve human cruisers simultaneously firing their Yamato cannons, turning his hive into a puddle of blood. He lost the sixth match of the day, with a record of zero wins and six losses. In the last match, he held out for 22 minutes and 23 seconds but was ultimately forced into a corner. His opponent’s tactics were seasoned, and the human units countered his Zerg with stability. The machine gunners of humans are a perverted type of soldiers in StarCraft . The speed of drawing a gun is zero. They shoot as soon as they draw their guns, and run away as soon as they put them away. Lu Mingfei’s dogs could not catch up, and they were shot one by one on the road.

In the chat group, his opponent was boasting, “In that last match, I didn’t even deploy a tank. Humans don’t need to use tanks against Zerg; pros don’t use tanks. Just spam units, an overwhelming amount of machine gunners mixed with medics rush forward, fighting and defending at the same time, you have to suppress the opponent’s Zerglings before they can upgrade. Just have to keep sending troops to fight. Then the cruiser formation will attack from the back, which is overwhelming …”

Lu Mingfei could imagine the guy’s exited face. No one was really paying attention; some were arguing, some were flirting, and then there was a certain girl selling products online who posted a picture of herself with her new Ferrari. The bored guys ignored the shining Ferrari and flocked to praise the girl for being slim and ethereal, with long, delicate legs, but the online sales girl didn’t reply; she probably had already drifted to other groups to post photos.

Years ago, this was a very professional “StarCraft” chat group, and even professional Korean players had come to give lectures, but nowadays, there were fewer people playing this game, and the chat group had turned into a market place. Lu Mingfei mixed in this market-like group, watching a bunch of people ramble on, enthusiastically playing an old, outdated game.

He exited the chat group and pulled up the QQ interface; the avatar of the girl in the baseball cap was still gray, and the message he left a few hours ago hadn’t received a reply. The other party hadn’t come online, and he waited in vain again.

Just as he was feeling disappointed, another avatar lit up. It was a panda with a smug expression. The person’s ID was “Lao Tang,” the one who just defeated him.

“Bro, honestly, you’re pretty strong; it’s not easy to win against you!” Lao Tang consoled him, “You just need to work on your micro, your tactical awareness is good. If you come online tomorrow, let’s play again.”

“Sure,” Lu Mingfei replied.

Lao Tang logged off, and in the reflection on the screen, Lu Mingfei smiled. If Lao Tang could see Lu Mingfei’s actual gameplay, he probably wouldn’t be so pleased; he would just angrily shout “jerk” and never want to play against him again.

Lu Mingfei’s laptop was an old IBM. He wasn’t using a mouse, without a mouse, but a red dot controller. Using a red dot to play StarCraft is something only a madman would do, like using a rolling pin to clean your ears. If he used a mouse, Lao Tang probably wouldn’t survive past the eighth minute. But Lu Mingfei was too lazy to tell Lao Tang that he was challenging the high difficulty level just out of boredom. What if Lao Tang didn’t want to play with him next time? There weren’t many people in the group who were serious about playing “StarCraft” anymore, and Lao Tang was one of the few.

However, Lu Mingfei had plenty of time to kill, yet she still didn’t come online after all this time. Why bother? Sometimes he told himself. Waiting like a fool for three or four hours to say two or three sentences felt somewhat unworthy. Shouldn’t every matter in life be calculated, only doing those worth doing?

“Buy a discount bag of milk, half a pound of Guangdong sausages, and the latest issue of ‘Sprout’ that Mingze wants. Hurry back after buying and prepare the celery on the table! Also, go check if there’s any mail from America at the property management! Still playing games? Aren’t you a little concerned about your own affairs? If no one accepts you, how will you get into a good University? What’s the point of spending so much money on you?” Aunt’s voice thundered from next door.

Lu Mingfei felt his head buzzing from the noise and quickly answered in succession, then hurried out the door.

The corridor was quiet, and the afternoon sunlight streamed in through the window at the end of the hallway, warming him. Ivory-white bedsheets were hung out to dry in the corridor, while the wind rustled the dark green leaves outside.

He leaned against the door, listening to the aunt inside still nagging and complaining, separated by the door, as if it was something from another world.

It was another spring, and Lu Mingfei was about to turn eighteen, in his third year of high school.

Series Navigation

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